Tuesday, August 29, 2017

We have a brand spanking new teacher in our family, my niece
who just graduated with a Master’s degree in Music Education.She is off to a small town in Southeast Alaska
and will be teaching choral, band, and orchestra to K-12! The school colors happen to be green and
yellow, hence the color choice of my card to send to her to congratulate her on
her new job.

First I reverse pressure embossed a section of Core’dinations
green/black cardstock and sanded away to highlight the musical design.Then I die cut it with Sizzix 560147 to
create the scalloped card front.The “back
2 school”, and “teacher” sentiments are from the Unity Smarty Pants set from September
2015.The “new” is from a VERY old All Night
Media Rubber Stamp Poet set that used to be foam mounted, it is from before 2000
if I am guessing right!Amazingly you
can still find it on eBay!The images
are stamped in Memento Cottage Ivy.The
die cut is from the same set as the scalloped card front.I added a bit of paper twine with a knot on
the front and then adhered the card together.

Saturday, August 26, 2017

The challenge at Imagine for August was to create motion and what
better way to have motion in a card than to create a mechanical Pull tab card
with a Vertigo Butterfly charm?Making
mechanical pop up and cards with motion is one of my favorite things to
do.The directions are organized to
allow for the various dry times and maximize your crafting time to work on
other steps during the process, but do check the pieces before proceeding to
avoid smearing your project.These cards
are so fun to create and bring so much joy to the recipient.

Level:Intermediate

Time:90 minutes plus
dry time

Step 1

Trim a heavy weight cardstock to 5” x 6 ½”, this will fit a
standard 6 Bar envelope.Strathmore
Bristol Board 100-pound weight is used throughout this project.Position stencil and apply Creative Medium in
a thin layer with a palette knife.

Step 2

Apply various weights of glitter to Creative Medium and set
aside to dry.The Creative Medium will
hold all kinds of fun embellishments in place.

Step 3

Die cut mechanical parts of the Hanging Charm Pull Tab card:
one base, two pull tabs, and two frames.Before cutting one frame apply Xyron permanent adhesive to the cardstock
for later assembly.Die cut one
butterfly charm from Taffeta Vertigo.

Trim corners of butterfly pull tab, cutting off the
tabs.This will now fit over the second pull
tag perfectly when assembled.

Step 8

Trim a section of Taffeta Vertigo to 3 ¼” x 4 ½”.This will be the base for the mechanism.Gently place Tear It Tape on recycled plastic
bag packaging and trim in half length-wise.

Step 9

Tear It Tape is placed on the mechanism where shown, both
long edges closest to the outside to allow the tabs to move along the track and
behind the notched opening for the pull tab.Center and apply to the Vertigo base.

Step 10

Apply Tear It Tape to open end of the mechanism.There is a slight indentation to train the
fold.

Step 11

Place tag with tabs through the notch and tuck tabs under
mechanism.Center in the slot and adhere
mechanism to the tag. (This tag was spritzed with Fireworks! in Pear Tart but
doesn’t really show in the finished card.)

Step 12

Spritz card base with Fireworks! in Pear Tart and set aside
to dry.

Step 13

Use metallic craft thread to fashion a hanger for the
butterfly charm.

Step 14

Tie a knot in the metallic thread just above the edge of the
frame. (At first I tried to hide the knot and it pulled out of the frame!)Lift the Xyron permanent adhesive liner and
center thread.

Step 15

Center second frame over the adhesive and slowly remove
liner to adhere the two sides of the frame together.

Step 16

Trim Tear It Tape length wise to fit the small sections on
the front of the mechanism.Place it
between the two folds.Adhere frame with
butterfly charm.

Step 17

Pull mechanism into full upright position with tag fully
extended out the back of the mechanism.Apply Tear It Tape around the edges.Adhere butterfly tag over the base pull tag.A small section should extend past the bottom
tag.

Step 18

Apply Tear It tape around the three edges of the Vertigo
base opposite the mechanism.Don’t put
tape on the fourth edge as it will show when the tag is in upright
position.

Step 19

Open mechanism and stamp sentiment in StazOn ink.Royal Purple is used here with a sentiment
from Joy Clair’s Butterfly Kisses stamp set.

Step 20

Adhere Vertigo and mechanism to card base.Punch a hole in the top of the pull tag and
thread decorative fibers through the hole and loop to hold in place.

Friday, August 11, 2017

What pre-teen boy doesn’t like blues, greens, and teals?For our teal challenge this month at Imagine I
wanted to try mixing two different Kaleidacolor ink pads to see if shades of
teal could be created.I think this card
illustrates success!

Kaleidacolor Blue
Breeze and Fresh Green are alternately brayered onto glossy 8 ½ “ x 11”
cardstock taking care to have the lighter hues line up in the fade.A light spritz of Ink Point No. 9 helps the
inks blend neatly on the glossy cardstock.Half of the sheet is die cut with the Sizzix Framelits Step Up Card die.The remainder of the sheet is used to die cut
the coordinating elements.The gifts
were cut twice each so the bows could be trimmed for contrasting colors then
adhered with On Point Glue.

A few days
ago, I accidentally split part of a bottle of Fireworks! Dandelion on my craft
mat, not wanting to waste this pretty ink I pressed Bristol Board cardstock
into the inky mess and set it aside for later use.This little incident provided the perfect
contrasting color for the candle flames and my son’s name.Each candle die cut is cut twice, once in
Fireworks! Dandelion and once in the Kaleidacolor mix.After trimming off the top to the top of the
Kaleidacolor flames they are adhered together with On Point Glue.The sentiment and cupcake layers adhered
together with On Point Glue.Some elements are popped up with dimensional
foam adhesive.The banner is held
together with paper cord before it is adhered to the card front.I am pleased with the results of my little
experiment and think my soon to be twelve-year-old son will be too!

Monday, August 7, 2017

I am pleased to be sharing a new double page layout for
Stick It Down.We have great sketches to
start with for every month.Go check it
out!For August this is a great sketch
for when you have just a few photos for an event.

My oldest son just turned 18!We had a very small family dinner as it has
been busy around here.So I picked the 3
photos of 5 that he let me take on that day.

I decided to work with the red from his shirt and pulled out
an old Fancy Pants Designs collection from 2009, Rough & Tough by
lili.I die cut a few circles from the
collection with Elizabeth Craft Designs 1116 Stitched Circles for the
background.Clear Scraps Shattered Glass
stencil and a bit of Bronze Creative Medium by Imagine added the grungy splattered
look to the background red.My first
mats around the photos didn’t stand out well against the other patterned
papers, so a very thin mat of black was added.My really old Quickutz Newsclips alphabet came in handy to die cut the
title.Over all I am pleased with the
simple layout, and am glad to have this memory preserved for his album!

Please stop out by Stick It Down and check out all the
sketches for the month of August and come play along!Thanks for stopping by!

Tuesday, August 1, 2017

We have another fun challenge for you at Retro Rubber BlogChallenge, colors that are often associated with another season but are used
for a summer project.Please join us and
have a little fun!

I went with just the three colors: white, Candy Red, and
Pearlescent Ivy for this thank you card.I used Fancy Pants Designs Bella Brush set.This set was a sheet of 12” x 12” acrylic
stamps, and it was retired for several years when I bought it in about 2008.So many options and I’ve not even scratched
the surface!I started with some foliage
stamped in Brilliance Pearlescent Ivy and heat embossed with clear embossing
powder.Next I added in a few of the
flowers in Brilliance Rocket Red but heat embossed with Candy Red embossing
powder.The sentiment is from
Inkadinkado Thanks set from 2011, which is stamped in Brilliance Pearlescent
Ivy and heat embossed with clear embossing powder.Elizabeth Craft Designs 1120 Stitched
Rectangles provide the perfect frames for the stamped images.I added a bit of SEI bakers twine across the
top and threaded it through the little pierced holes.A tiny bow attached with a glue dot finishes
off the top layer.I love the shimmer of
the Brilliance Pearlescent Ivy which I inked on with an Ink Blusher.The card base has the Brilliance Rocket Red
to add the last little zing of color for the card.

Thanks so much for stopping by!Do go visit Retro Rubber and play along with
our challenge.Remember to use at least
one stamp that is more than a year old and let us know how long you’ve had it
in your stash!Enter up to 10 challenges
including ours and you are good to go!

Festive Christmas Colors Card

Take Ten Published Artist

Stampers' Sampler Published Artist

Joining the fun as

Double Page DT

About Me

Hectic as my life is . . . I have a desire to decompress by creating in my craft cave! Currently we have 34 residents on our mini-farm, which includes four humans. Our two active athletic boys keep us running to their various activities. I work for our business doing accounting and HR paperwork, as a substitute teacher in local High Schools, and now as a Community College Chemistry Instructor. Despite the busyness of life, my scrapping, altered art, and card making all provide a respite of creative energy and renewal.